Stolen Papers
by CattheLion
Summary: In which a respected social scientist, and a sweet-toothed thief meet through a pack of cards. Gaius/Miriel shipfic...that I wrote for an English assessment. Modern day AU. Based loosely on support conversations.


**AN: A GaiusxMiriel ("Stolen Papers") Modern Day AU. Wrote for an English assessment.  
Yes, I wrote a not-so-thinly veiled shipfic for my English assessment. It also explains the extreme overuse of literary techniques.  
I would appreciate reviews, please!  
Prompt: "To end with the line, 'How wrong he was'."**

Stolen Papers  
Genres: Romance/Family/Emotional

It was not him that I was interested in.  
Overcoming my hesitance, I take a firm step towards the classically themed pack of cards. Their rough edges of worn and well-thumbed card tickle my thumb and feel good under it as I run it along the edges. The downwards motion springboards dust into the air.

The once bothersome light that had been glinting through my glasses, and into my eye, suddenly turns into a spellbinding spectacle, as particles of dust drift past, illuminated by the slim beam that had come through a slimmer-still gap in the curtains.  
As pretty as it looks, I dislike the light now. It's wrong. I paw for the edge of the curtain, and another familiar texture graces my fingertips. I dislike that too, and pull my hand away after roughly yanking them closed. The light still filters through the white fabric, but that's science; I can't stop that.  
Regardless, the room is substantially dim.

I return to the pack of cards. A thick, woven ribbon secures them all together. I remember the ribbons well from the hanger straps of my navy blue dress, the formal garment likely still dangling from a hanger in our bedroom's wardrobe, upstairs.  
I'll drag myself to that room later. I'm having trouble keeping my emotions in check in the dining room, and there is no bigger reminder of the man in jail than his empty bed.  
Our empty bed.

The bouncing, melodic tones of the cards lightly _twang _beneath my fingertips as I pace the room, sliding my thumb up and down again and again. My heavy footsteps add to a tune that I was unwitting to the creation of.

Slowly sitting down on a forlorn armchair, I stop and mournfully focus on the winding patterns of the deep green backs.

Almost a decade ago, they had been brandished so cockily at the heaving and dull-witted gaggle of the pub's most frequent visitors.  
In a harsh accent, Gaius had grinned, and called for them to, "Keep an eye on the Jack of Spades!" A fluid motioning took the Jack of Spades up into his worn, grimy sleeve. His audience did not notice this movement; the green back of the card camouflaged nicely with the dull fabric of his sleeve, coloured like moss.  
Gaius' northern intonations slinked coyly around their minds. He chewed a sweet, revealed the card again, and made some vague gestures as if to explain it. The alcoholics- somewhat flabbergasted- struggled to understand the fascinating trick.

The red head snuck away from the table, but I pushed through the clusters of unsavoury patrons in an effort to catch up.  
"What, Specs?" He responded with a grunt. I removed my hand from his shoulder, and frowned at the nickname. It suggested such familiarity, yet we had never met. Our only common ground was the colour of our hair- although even then we failed to find similarities, between his bright orange and my modest auburn.  
Likely, he had garnered the name from my glasses.  
I recovered and got straight to business.  
"Your card tricks. Show me, please."  
A raised eyebrow was my response.  
"You sure?"  
"Yes. Undoubtedly so."

Under an unspoken agreement, we left the clutches of the pub's dingy walls and peeling interior. Aesthetically, the outside was no better, but the crushing sounds of shouts and drinks clinking together were not preferable to the regular beat of cars crawling past.

I believed that it was a mild day. Yes, cold. Yes, slightly breezy. A perfectly pale grey sky, devoid of the soft texture of the clouds' outlines, stretched over us.  
The beauty of the pub garden was laughable. We walked down iron grey paths of chalky gravel. The exterior of the building was nothing but lumpy, roughly applied plaster in a bitterly urban shade of white.  
Shoddily cut grass burned emerald green, a contrast to the cold whites and greys, but it was yellowing and patchy. The cool, earthy scent wafted into my nose, slightly pungent.

Abysmal metal picnic tables lined the bottom of the 'garden'. The chairs we sat on were part plastic, part metal. The seats and the backrests of them were little more than filthy white strips of starchy cloth, stretched across the metal frame in the hopes of being deemed comfy.

Hardly the most romantic spot, but as previously stated, it was not him who had put me into a state of rapture.

Awkwardly, we shuffled our seats in. They scraped agonisingly across the gritty beige concrete that masqueraded as a patio.  
We exchanged names. Gaius looked at me warily for a second, but then launched into a rambling explanation, garbled by unintelligible mumbling. It was like watching a schoolchild explaining the latest batch of sums or science; unenthusiastic and forced. I stopped him.  
"So…this is 'sleight of hand'?"  
"Yeah…so you see, I'm holding the card here…" The Jack of Spades was in his right hand. "Aaaand…" Up his sleeve, once again.  
"You've put it up your sleeve."  
Gaius blinked at me in surprise, but he looked almost crestfallen. I supposed he was not used to the slightly less inhibited eyesight of the sober.  
"Yeah…well. Ahem." His cough was a poor means of dislodging the subject from our conversation. I had not then picked up on it, so I persisted.  
"Do you have any more of those…sleight of hand card tricks?"  
His sulky expression was quickly replaced by a glimmer of mischievous inspiration. In spite of his butchered explanation, he obviously loved these tricks.  
We tried again.

Gaius piled sweets such as bon bons into his mouth each time I guessed correctly. An aggravating crunch signalled his stress. Then he stood up.  
"Alright, Specs." He chucked me a slightly melted bag of chocolate coins, which rattled as they slid towards me, a few inches from the edge of the table.  
"You…you win. We _need _to meet up again. I'm not going to be able to sleep easy until I do something completely and utterly unexpected. I'm going to shock you."

I was doubtful of that ever happening.

Our further meetings proved me right; somewhat endearingly, he had always been so certain of his chances of tricking me: hat, collar, scarf, coat pocket, trouser leg…  
A list of just half the places he tried to hide that within, and therefore a list of just half the places that I had correctly guessed.

We began to meet frequently. At first, card tricks. Then general discussions. Clumsily, albeit, I had secretly started to learn the art of sleight of hand myself.

Then, he asked me out.  
A failed attempt at surprising me- sweaty hands, a desire to impress, brushing our hands together whenever the opportunity presented itself- I had noticed the signals.  
However, ironically, it was a very successful attempt at attracting me.

Gaius was not predictable, by any means. Yet, I could always pick up on his thoughts and secrets. That has not changed, although I'll admit that it has become harder, as of late.

Around our third or fourth date, we discussed our careers. As bashful as he was of telling me his, once again, I was still not surprised…  
He used subject-specific lexicon, referring to his ever-abundant store of sweets as a 'cache'.  
He wore clothes that did not stand out, or alert him as a cat among the pigeons.  
His body was wiry, slim and flexible. Perfect for sneaking in through windows.  
And through our sessions of sleight of hand, I had seen more than enough evidence that he had nimble, silvery fingers.

Unusual by his standards, he procrastinated eating the sugary dessert that he had ordered for us. One's behaviour changes when they are anxious, or under stress and pressure.

I wonder what kind of pressures he must have been under when he did what he did.

I acknowledged his career path. It would certainly be interesting to see what compelled him to do such things, and I promised his secrecy.

I told him that I was a social scientist. But even after I researched the thought patterns of him, and those like him, I still come to a dead end when I wonder what compelled him to do such a thing, regardless of the risks and consequences.

The rest of our relationship was uneventful, by typical standards. We are married, and he has been a wonderful father to our Laurent. That one fact chokes me up. Gaius had not passed his sweet tooth onto our son- but I had passed on my Asperger's.  
Gaius' only response was to be supportive.

I suppose that supporting our family is what drives him. Yet, this is the first time he's let me back into our house. He had not blocked the door, but the barricade is formed of memories of him. I have stayed with Sully for weeks, Laurent with his friend Gerome, and this was the day I finally tried to get him out of my mind.

In the build-up to his crime, through the trial and the sentence, and the aftermath I have been living through, I've been looking at him through rose-tinted spectacles. He was lazy, he wasn't the most sociable person, and by the Lord did he hurt me at times. I know that he has flaws, but at the moment, I refuse to embrace them. He was kind, he was a fox, and his wit was to house a xerophile- a small organism that only habits the driest of environments. Even our arguments are the warm sun of our relationship, in comparison to what he has done now.

He was still the same person I married when he did it, and in his cell, he is still the same man. But, I feel as though I'm in the house of an absolute stranger.

One more familiar thing, in my memories of Gaius, rises up within me. In my hours of thinking of him, I've practically invited it to tea.  
I look in the dusty mirror, and see two faces.  
I know that one is my face, and I recognise sadness' face there too.

One last memory: when he proposed to me.  
Of course, that hadn't shocked me either. He gave up then.  
"I'm never going to be able to do something, and shock you, am I?"

I put the kettle on in a feeble attempt to stew my own emotions, and I invite Sadness over for another meeting again while I'm at it.  
"I'm never going to be able to do something, and shock you, am I?"

How wrong he was.


End file.
